The stats are in and the race for College Soccer recruitment is even hotter than ever. Reports indicate that nearly a million high school students are playing soccer between both men and women teams. Of those million, less than 3% end up playing for Division I college soccer teams.

Is it any wonder that high school players are searching for the best camps?

But with so many choices, how can you find the one that’s right for you and your college soccer dreams? You want a camp that provides a great education and puts you in front of the country’s top coaches?

Today we’re going to be examining the Premier 125 camp and find out for ourselves if this one’s worth your time and money.

Who organizes and runs Premier 125

This amazing organization is led by Clinic Director and former Landmark Conference Coach of the Year, Goucher Head Coach Bryan Laut. Laut and the members of the Goucher College Men’s Soccer staff are the men behind their annual I.D. Clinic and strive to provide the best quality college soccer education they possibly can.

The camp does this by following their goal of being “The Ultimate Soccer Education For the Serious Soccer Player”. This means that this camp is dedicated to providing great soccer camp experiences. They do this by recruiting the nation’s top coaching staffers from all three divisions of play to provide an accurate, intense, and well-rounded education that many students have to work for years to possibly match.

But what have we discovered?

Based on Laut’s involvement as the head of the organization as well as Premier 125s use of the field, dorms, and facilities of Goucher College in Baltimore Maryland, it’s clear that this camp focuses on this university.

With the motto of providing the ultimate experience for serious players, this camp provides valuable training and education for all players, regardless of their interest in joining the Goucher roster.

This tells us that Premiere 125’s organizers and leaders are trusted by at least one Collegiate Athletic Team and Staff, and as we’ll see later, they certainly get results.

Let’s take a moment to examine Premier 125 and their origins.

History of Premier 125

According to their twitter page, Premier 125 has had an online presence since 2008, with their first Tweet and Facebook post both reporting their arrival to the platform and their hope for another successful year on February 19, 2014. These posts would be a mere 5 days before their first Online posted early bird registration specials were announced.

While businesses and training camps having online presences are nothing new we can reasonably guess that Premier 125 was not only an early adopter of Twitter which started about 2 years prior, but it was determined to reserve their name as they focused on building their brand.

Since 2008, the camp has made regular postings before and after their various camps. Usually this was to announce early bird specials, alert parents to when space was nearly filled, and to announce success stories.

But you may be wondering one big question.

Was anyone famous at this camp?

As it turns out, there were. While the camp was always a popular destination for colleges looking for talented hopefuls, it soon began recruiting coaches to support their teaching efforts. Premier 125 had a big announcement one month after their first tweet, when Devin Rensing was announced as Camp Director on March 14, 2014.

Big names from Tufts University, Upenn, Stevens, Goucher, and more would then join Rensing in giving quality teaching and guidance to campers. This would start a frequent trend of Premier 125 calling on the big names in sports to lend their teaching expertise to students and campers.

Collegiate Soccer fans will know that this is a big deal, since Devin Rensing is the current head coach of The Ducks, from Stevens Institute of Technology. Premiere 125 would later go on to have other big names lending a hand to campers, such as Evan Scheffey from York College.

Did anything change at the camp since it’s founding?

As you can guess, initially the camp was only open to High School boys. The program organizers always knew that this was not enough, since nearly half of all high school Soccer players were girls. That’s why on January 2016, the camp made a Facebook posting that announced that they have opened their doors to a girls High School Camp.

The camp was also always interested and eager to take part in the International Soccer stage. That’s why campers had the chance to train in Bermuda as announced in August of 2016. Rare opportunities like these give campers the chance to witness what athletics are like across the sea, which has always been proven to be great for teamwork and adaptability.

In , after five sold-out camping seasons, Premiere 125 opened their first middle school boys and girls camp to go along their famous boys camp. This three day program hit its mark with parents and campers alike, which only solidified the camp’s stellar reputation.

So in summary, from their earliest origins, Premiere 125 has been a leader in providing training for up and coming soccer stars.

But let’s go back and talk about some of the universities that you can see at the camp.

Overview of the Colleges that sponsor the camp

With their camp located on and making use of the Goucher university campus, it’s clear that Premier 125 has a warm relationship with this prestigious university. But there are other names that you can expect to see year by year, with the website boasting 24 different Universities and Colleges as recent training staff.

Other universities that have been announced include; UPenn, Monmouth, VMI, Stevenson, McDaniel, Alleghany, Sarah Lawrence, Cecil, and Notre Dame of MD. This isn’t an exhaustive list though, as the camp reaches out to Universities every year to provide the best education for their campers.

But what about this year’s coaching staff?

The website has a handy page that can tell you who has joined the Summer Camp for this year. As of this date, the list below are the coaches who have been announced for this camp season.

What division most commonly recruits from this camp?

While many Division I teams pay close attention to the players from Premier 125, the camp strives to be the total package for collegiate soccer training. This means that the camp works with all levels of Divisional play and many campers have found recruitment and scholarships with Division I, II, and III teams.

This leads us to believe that Premier 125 is concerned primarily with helping their campers excel rather than appealing to the highest level of NCAA Soccer competition.

But what does this mean for me?

What this means, is that whether you have met the requirements for Division I play or you are a talented athlete who is better suited for Division III teams, you can find valuable training with Premiere 125.

Our findings show that the program organizers are more concerned with excellence for its campers and staff. This performance first attitude is refreshing and has certainly paid dividends for campers and the organization alike.

With the history out of the way, let’s look at the types of camps that Premier 125 has to offer.

Tell me about the Soccer Camp

The annual summer camp is a three day program that is designed to help shape tomorrow’s Soccer stars. It has an intense schedule that is focused on helping campers master play and develop strong habits that will enhance their own personal training, as well as make them valuable players on the teams that recruit them.

As we have seen, the camp will be headed, ran, and managed by some pretty big names in Collegiate sports, which only adds to the intense value that this offers to up and coming athletes. Below is a list of the three day program schedule that can give you a better idea of what to expect.

Day one uses a few hours for check-ins, after which introductions and initial training is had. The workshop is brilliantly focused on proper training regiments to help identify its role in providing match day readiness and excellence. After an evening meal, the campers have their first match of the weekend.

Day one is all about building up to match day readiness. This is a smart way of preparing campers for collegiate level experience.

Day two features two chances at matches, with a smaller tournament and a match day. The mid-day training session provides a great way for campers to practice the lessons learned during the workshop on training from Day one. A final note is that this workshop focuses on what it feels like to play College soccer. This is designed as a wake-up call and realistic depiction of what changes from High School to College.

Campers will have a better idea of what it’s like to play for a University team. They will also understand what to expect when they are eventually recruited.

Participating coaches will likely have a good idea of which campers they want for their teams. So there’s a chance that contact could be made.

The final day of camp starts off with a training session like all the others. But instead of a side tournament, campers will prepare for the last workshop of the weekend. This workshop will tell campers best practices to be recruited by their favorite teams.

After the last matches of the day, organizers and coaches will say farewell and assist with checkout for the campers.

The camp is a condensed version of the entire recruitment process that you can expect for your college sports dreams. From training hard to play well on the field. From actual match day performance to making contacts and building rapports with recruiting coaches. Many current college athletes will tell you that this is the way it works for everyone.

But you may be wondering if Premier 125 only runs one event a year. Well, as it turns out, they do have another camp that’s worth talking about.

Tell me about the other Premier 125 camp.

Premier 125 offers a One Day ID Clinic that is staffed exclusively by Goucher College Staff and is designed for student athletes from grades 9-12. The camp offers you a chance to show off your skills while coaches and trainers will instruct you on ways you can improve your performance.

This intense afternoon of work pushes your game to the next level while giving you a condensed experience of what a college soccer atmosphere can be like. Participants will not only get a better idea of what high level College Play is like, but you’ll also learn how to prepare and push yourself to that level.

But what do we do at ID Camp?

The following is a schedule of what you can expect from your 4 and a half hours with the camp.

From start to finish, after sign up and registration, campers will get started on working on their technical skills. Passing, scoring, running, and other essential skills will be put to the test, with coaches telling you what you could do to improve.

From there, you’ll have side games to warm you up for the later game that closes out the training day, with a brief seminar about the college recruiting seminar.

In a lot of ways, this mirrors the format of the larger three day camp in that it focuses on training and basics, builds into actual match game experience, and offers you tips on how to find success in hunting down recruitment and scholarships.

By now you’re probably sold on this amazing camp, but let’s take a moment to figure out who is actually signing up.

Tell me more about my fellow campers

As with all college soccer hopefuls, anyone who takes part in these camps are serious about finding recruitment and scholarships to play for their favorite NCAA teams. The teams that have recruited participants of Premier 125 include some of the big names in all three Divisions of play.

But if you are interested in playing for Goucher, Stevens, VMI, or McDaniel, then this camp will be of especial interest to you. These universities represent the most frequent participants of camp events, and this is especially true for Goucher which runs the annual ID Camp.

Keep in mind though that as this organization has had international events, it’s also drawn in players who wanted a more worldly experience to add versatility to their list of skills and traits.

Hundreds of students participate in these camps per session, so you won’t want to miss out.

So what do we know from all this information?

Premier 125 is known as being one of the leaders for college preparatory camps in the country with a focus on building stronger players and adding amazing talent to national teams. It has involvement at all levels of NCAA play and recruits some of the best to provide students quality education and training.

We also learn that Premier 125 has a focus on versatility and international attendance and play, so you’ll want to keep an eye out for any events that may be held overseas. All of these benefits also come with some of the best pricing in the industry, as the organization works to make itself affordable compared to their competitors.

While we wish that the website was a little clearer on statistic numbers as well as program ownership, with several sold out years under its belt the facts are clear. Premier 125 is on the top shelf of high-quality training camps.

You can learn more by checking out their website.

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